Olive and the Prickly Pear

Those of you who have interacted with Olivia know that she doesn’t cry. Ever.

She fell down the side entry stairs the other day (okay, so it’s only 4 steps!) and let out a cry/yell until I came to her rescue; then she was fine. She stepped off the bench in Mom’s kitchen and hit the hard tile floor. No crying. She climbs onto the dogs while they maniacally wrestle with each other, snarling teeth bared. No fear.

So last weekend when she cried on and off for over and hour, even breaking out in hives, I knew that something was wrong.

We were in Mayville the Friday after Thanksgiving. Dad and JB were fixing my car in the barn. (THANK YOU, Dad!!—I had needed a new pump for my windshield wiper fluid. He just happened to have a spare laying around. Who does that?? My Dad. He’s awesome. Well, it also helps to drive the same kind of car as the rest of the family, too.)

Mom, K, Annie, O and I were in the kitchen. O was standing at the sliding doors, watching the birds, etc. Then she cruises (yes, she’s cruising now!) quietly over to the table on which sits Dad's giant blooming Christmas cactus and a pair of binoculars. She was interested in the binoculars, and as the Christmas cactus isn't that sharp, us girls let her continue to play while we talked. We failed to notice the prickly pear cactus living in the pot, too, which Liv did NOT fail to notice. So she grabbed it with her pudgy little left hand.

A million little fiberglass-like splinters embedded themselves into her hand. In the palm. Between her fingers. All over her thumb. Everywhere.

Sad, sad bird.

She cried and cried. We tried all sorts of remedies. She tried so hard to be brave. She would stop crying, and then reach her hand out for a toy, and it would hurt again and she would cry again. After trying lip wax (getting some of the pokers out) and soaking her hand in warm water (fail—baby uncooperative), I took her to the barn to get some duct tape from Dad at Mom’s suggestion. Dad agreed on the remedy and said to make little balls for her to grab in her hands that would pull the pickers out.

So we did that. A few times. And got most, if not all, out..

Unfortunately her hand was still sore from the poking of the needles. So she still cried some more.

But then Grandpa got out the spinning top and all woes were forgotten. Who can cry when there’s fun to be had in Toptown??

Hit and Run

Krystal called me last Thursday to casually inform me that I was her emergency contact person. Random, I know. It was finals week and she had just finished taking her exams. Now all she had to do was finish up her work week at the school cafeteria, and then pack her things and say goodbye to her beautiful Yakeley-Gilchrist dorm room located on MSU's beautiful old North Campus.

Talking to K this time of year always makes me nostalgic for MSU. Spring at MSU is one of my favorite memories. If you've never been to MSU's campus in the Spring, you're missing out. The campus is laden with trees in full bloom: cherry and apple blossoms, dogwood, magnolia. There are flowering bushes everywhere and more tulips than you could throw a stick at. Students are all out on the grass, studying or playing frisbee, and sharing the lawn with the squirrels and ducks.

Here are some shots from my days there. They don't look very nice because I scanned old photos with my flatbed scanner, instead of having the negatives professionally scanned (I totally missed these when I did a big negative scan a few years ago. Bummer!). But you get the point.

A few short hours after Krystal and I spoke, she calls me again, in tears. She had been riding her bike on MSU's campus when she was hit by a big old green van. A big old green van that KEPT ON GOING after it took my sister down. I was so pissed. She filed a police report but she didn't get the license plate because she was too busy getting whiplash and a concussion, so the police didn't hold out any hope for catching the a-hole.

Krystal said that three other people were around when this happened. Two didn't even stop (you're lucky I wasn't there, JERKS!). One girl asked Krystal if she was all right, and she was in so much shock that she said that she was, and the girl left. After sitting on the sidewalk for a few minutes she realized what had happened and called the police.


She felt pretty beat up but thought she was okay, so she went to work. A few hours later she had a massive headache and got worried. When she called me I suggested that she lay down for a few hours to see how she feels.

"What if I have a brain aneurism?!??" she cried. She was starting to get worked up.

"What?" I said.

"I don't want to end up like Natasha Richardson!!" Now she was really crying.

Who the heck is Natasha Richardson? I wondered. I know that K has a friend named Natasha, but I didn't think she had head problems...

Krystal explained that Natasha Richardson was Liam Neeson's wife who recently died from a brain aneurism after a skiing accident.

Oh, THAT lady. I'm sooo not a celebrity follower. I'm proud of that.


After talking her down, Krystal decided to go to the emergency room. She had been freaked out about making Mom and Dad angry by running up their medical bills, as K has had several trips to the doctor or ER this year. Mom reassured her that if she was hurt, she needed to get checked out. That's life.

So she did. And she is okay, despite the whiplash, concussion, and hurt knee and elbow.

Krystal and I found it ironic that just a few hours before her accident she had put me as her emergency contact, and then an emergency happened.

I am really steamed that the van driver didn't stop after he hit K. She is hurt, and her cool vintage bike is probably totalled (though she wants to see if Dad, the fix-it man, can resurrect it).

Sadly for K, Spring at MSU probably won't have the same whistful, bird-chirping, lovely garden, sunshiny feeling as it does for me. Poor girl...